Many are resistant because they do not want their symptoms to be labeled a “disorder”, as in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Can a name alone really be that powerful?

According to Belleruth Naparstek, LISW, author of Invisible Heroes, there is a strong move away from using Post Traumatic Stress Disorder to describe the long-term results of severe trauma.

Many military personnel dealing with this condition feel stigmatized by being told they have a disorder. Even just the diagnosis of “PTSD” can be devastating to patients and families.

Watch below as Belleruth discusses the use of the term “PTSD” when treating trauma. It’s only 4 minutes long.

Click here to sign up.

Actually, many people feel that Post Traumatic Stress is not a disorder at all – it is really a normal response to an abnormal situation.

We’ve talked to the leading practitioners and researchers in the trauma field and have used their insight to craft an expert training program for treating trauma.

In our talk with Belleruth this Wednesday, we will delve into:

• Why guided imagery is especially effective with traumatized patients
• How to overcome treatment barriers with combat veterans
• The treatment of moral injury and why it is essential when working with soldiers
• Common mistakes practitioners make in working with military personnel
• Using the internet to connect with survivors of tragedy

The sessions are free if you listen at the time of broadcast – you just have to sign up.

In the meantime, what’s your opinion on whether to use PTSD or PTS – or something else entirely? Please leave a comment below. 

Working with soldiers can be challenging – especially since we are often not familiar with their environment.

After getting countless emails we realized this video has touched many people, and so we wanted to repost it.

And actually, to our surprise – it’s been viewed by some pretty “high-ups” in the military.

In it, Belleruth Naparstek, LISW, shares a story about how she worked with 1st Sergeant Dave Rauls to create a guided imagery introduction that military personnel really get. I think you’ll be surprised by the ending.

If you have a soldier in your practice, or in your life, you think would benefit from this video, you can share it by sending them this link:
http://www.nicabm.com/nicabmblog/mind-body-medicine-helps-military-personnel-heal/

We’ll talk a whole lot more about guided imagery and the mind-body medicine approach to trauma in our upcoming webinar with Belleruth as part of NICABM’s 2012 Trauma Therapy Series. It’s free to attend, you just have to sign up.

We had a great discussion around this video the first time we released it. Now we want to hear from you. Please share your thoughts with a comment below.

But did you know that the physical patterns of our body not only reflect how we’re feeling inside but can actually cause those feelings?

When working with trauma patients, noticing patterns and changes in body language gives us greater insight into what patients are experiencing. We can also use these observations to develop healthy body exercises that patients can use to help control their symptoms.

Pat Ogden, PhD, is the founder and director of the Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute, which provides training in somatic and body-based approaches to trauma treatment.

Watch below to hear an example of how we can use sensorimotor psychotherapy to heal trauma.

Click here to sign up.

The effects of trauma run so deep that they become ingrained in our patients’ body language.

Through sensorimotor therapy, we can recognize and use these body patterns to further understand and explore their trauma.

In the full interview, we will also discuss:

• How to manage arousal and integration problems caused by trauma
• Helping your patients safely expand their window of tolerance
• Uncovering the root cause of your patient’s attachment issues
• Using mindfulness to create positive connections to the body

This is just one of six cutting-edge sessions included in our 2012 Trauma Therapy comprehensive training program.

It’s free to listen at the time of broadcast, you just have to sign up.

To what extent do you use body language when creating treatments for your patients? Please leave us a comment below.

If you’re an American football fan, you may have been following the NFL draft.

While this isn’t usually my cup of tea, one of our staff pointed out a rather irregular draft choice: the drafting of paralyzed Rutgers football player Eric LeGrand to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. LeGrand was paralyzed in October 2010 after injuring his spinal cord during a football game. His doctors thought that he would be a quadriplegic in need of a respirator, but he has proven them wrong.

He started breathing on his own five weeks after the accident, can operate a wheelchair, and has even stood up, though with the help of a metal frame.

His goal is to someday go back to the same spot where he was injured, lay down on the field in the same position…and then walk away.

When I read this, I immediately thought of Peter Levine’s somatic experiencing, which encourages traumatized patients to go through the same physical motions as when they experienced their trauma, but this time escaping harm.

The thought behind this is that the body gets stuck in fight-flight-freeze, having not been able to complete the motions at the time that the trauma occurred.

By completing the interrupted physical motions, the resulting trauma can start to heal.

LeGrand is trying to do the same thing, with the NFL draft being an unusual assistant in the process.

We like to talk about trauma resulting from war, rape, and domestic violence, but shouldn’t overlook trauma that can be caused by things like car accidents, medical procedures, and health problems.

Would you like to learn more about effective approaches to treating trauma?

We are offering a brand new comprehensive training program, New Interventions for Treating Trauma, which will provide you with specific new interventions and treatment protocols that are getting quicker, more targeted results.

Topics will include:

• How childhood trauma impairs brain development and what that means for treatment
• Can yoga reverse the secondary brain damage caused by trauma?
• How to help your patients safely expand their window of tolerance
• How music cues vagal regulation and why this could help your trauma patients
• Why guided imagery is especially effective with people who have been traumatized
• Unique problems (and opportunities) in couples therapy with trauma survivors and their partners

You can listen to the interviews for free at the time of initial broadcast, you just need to sign up.

Have you had a patient traumatized by health problems? What approaches have you used to help heal this trauma? Please leave a comment below.

But according to Richard Restak, MD, video games can improve the brain at any age. In fact, certain types of games have even been shown to increase IQ in older adults.

Richard Restak is the Clinical Professor of Neurology at George Washington Hospital University and author of Think Smart: A Neuroscientist’s Prescription for Improving Your Brain’s Performance.

Watch below to learn how video games can change the brain.  

Click here to sign up.

It’s fascinating to hear how these games could make us sharper and quicker.

But of course, there is a downside to video games, too. We’ll be getting into all of this in tonight’s special bonus call for Gold Subscribers.

We’ll also discuss:

• How you and your clients can benefit from video gaming
• Strategies to enhance the creative side of your brain
• Fact or fiction: Can our brains really multitask?
• How to protect your brain against aging

It’s not too late to register for a Gold Subscription and join the call – here’s the link.

In the meantime, do you have a story about how video games have affected some of your patients? Please leave us a comment below. 

Yes, I realize that when you register for a Gold Subscription, you receive the transcripts, audio and video recordings, special bonus webinars, and even possible CE/CME credits.

But when you get a Gold Subscription, you’re doing more than just buying the webinars.

You’re supporting our series.

It’s the Gold Subscribers who make it possible for us to keep going – to broadcast these cutting-edge webinars free of charge to practitioners throughout the world, many of them from very poor countries.

And when practitioners are empowered with both ideas and applications, they are even more effective in their work with patients.

They are better equipped to change lives.

But it’s not only practitioners who participate in the series. On any given night, about 20 % of the viewers of the free broadcast are lay people. And because of your gold subscription, they are better equipped to change their own lives.

Your Gold Subscription really does make a difference.

I just saw this comment from our Wednesday night call, and I wanted to share it with you.

I would just like to say a Big Thank You all who buy the gold product of this series…I’m so glad its free to us who can’t afford the price of the Gold…I’ve learned so much from just listing to the talks and the where of the what and how it works…and that a head ache isn’t just a pain in the head…and that addiction isn’t just being an addict one size doesn’t fit all…Wow now that’s saying something more people need to know…

-Mary, Mother, Grand Mother, Great Grand Mother, North Highlands California

So thank you to Mary, for sharing your comment with all of us, and thank you Gold Subscribers.

Your subscriptions make it possible for us to create new series for you with even more experts and ideas for your work.

In fact, we’ve got something exciting planned for the near future . . .

. . . and we’re looking forward to sharing it with you.

In the meantime, what have you used from the series so far? Please take a moment now to share a comment below. If you haven’t used any of the ideas yet, what’s one you’re excited to try?

Because brain science, when artfully applied, can make a difference – it can truly heal people’s lives.

And when someone’s brain changes, they respond with fewer fear-based reactions.

Just that alone can plant the seeds of change across families, communities, and even nations (more on that tomorrow. . . I’ll send you an email about something really cool).

But that isn’t all that brain science can do . . .

We created this video to share the highlights of this year’s series.

I hope you’ll take a moment to check it out now.

Plus, I’ve asked the tech team to report in on all 72 of the countries represented in this series (using Google Analytics). Here are the results:

That’s 72 countries listed above. 72 places where practitioners will be using brain science to target their treatments and get faster, more direct results with patients.

And we know how important faster results are when our patients are desperate for relief.

So thank you to all the people from around the world who participated in the webinars and on the comment boards throughout the series.

Now my hope is that we’ll be able to use what we’ve learned to keep changing lives . . . and the world.

Did you take part in this series? What was one of the biggest “ah-ha” moments you had on the webinars? Please leave a comment below and let us know.

If you missed the series, it’s not too late – you can download the transcripts, audio and video recordings, plus 3 special bonus webinars with a Gold Subscription – here’s the link.

Let’s take depression.

Anhedonia – or the loss of pleasure or reward, is one of the hallmarks of depression.

For years, scholars have debated the cause of anhedonia. Is it a reduced ability to feel pleasure or is it more of an inability to sustain pleasure over a long time?

To look at this issue, University of Wisconsin researcher Richard J. Davidson, PhD and his laboratory took functional magnetic resonance images (fMRI) of 27 depressed individuals and 19 control participants.

During the course of the 37-minute fMRI, two groups of participants were shown positive and negative images. Those in the first group were told to try “enhancing” or “suppressing” their emotional responses, an exercise in which they had been previously trained.

The second group of participants was told to simply pay attention to the images as they normally would without enhancing or suppressing their emotions.

Participants also used self-reporting tools to measure the intensity of their emotions.

The result?

Depressed individuals showed a specific decrease in activation in the nucleus accumbens (part of the reward center of the brain) across time, while control subjects maintained their level of activation.

Overall, it was more difficult for depressed patients to sustain nucleus accumbens (NAcc) engagement when presented with positive images that should have caused positive emotions.

This decrease in activity paralleled the self-report of depressed participants – not only was brain activity down, but participants confirmed that they felt less positive as well.

Davidson et al. concluded that the loss of pleasure may result from an inability to sustain activity in the fronto-striatal network leading to problems processing rewards and a reduction in positive affect.

You can read the entire study in the December 2009 volume of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA.

Please keep in mind that because this was not a randomized study (how would you randomize depression?) we need to be careful when drawing conclusions.

However, investigators attempted to manage this by recruiting a control group (matched for gender and age) of people who were not depressed.

This is just one example of the interconnected nature of emotions and the brain. Davidson has spent years studying this topic and recently co-authored The Emotional Life of Your Brain with Sharon Begley, Senior Health & Science Correspondent at Reuters.

Sharon will be part of the New Brain Science 2012 series.

During our talk this week, we’ll be discussing:

• The six emotional styles of the brain and what that means for your clients
• Emotional types involved with autism and depression
• Techniques for working with the brain’s emotional style
• The power of neuroplasticity for treating stroke and Tourette’s Syndrome
• Three interventions to strengthen neuroplasticity

You can watch for free at the time of broadcast, you just need to sign up.

Does having brain research like this help you explain diagnoses and treatments to patient? Please leave a comment below.

And according to Sharon Begley, there are two forces that shape our brain throughout life.

Sharon Begley is the Senior Health & Science Correspondent at Reuters and co-author of The Emotional Life of Your Brain with Richard Davidson, PhD.

Watch below as she talks about these two forces.

Click here to sign up.

As Sharon said, that’s neuroplasticity!

We’ll get into a whole lot more about ways to change the brain in our interview with Sharon.

You can watch the entire interview Wednesday night as part of the New Brain Science 2012 series, when we’ll also discuss:

• The six emotional styles of the brain and what that means for your clients
• Emotional types involved with autism and depression
• Techniques for working with the brain’s emotional style
• The power of neuroplasticity for treating stroke and Tourette’s Syndrome
• Three interventions to strengthen neuroplasticity

You can listen for free at the time of broadcast, you just have to sign up.

Do you have a neuroplasticity story of your own? Please leave a comment below.

Depression or stroke?

In a study published in the October 2011 volume of Stroke, depression is correlated with increased risk of stroke in females.

Researchers led by Kathryn Rexrode, MD followed 80,574 women who were part of the Nurses’ Health Study. These women were 54 to 79 years old and without a prior history of stroke.

They assessed depressive symptoms multiple times with a Mental Health Index. Anti-depressant use was reported every two years beginning in 1996, and physicians diagnosed depression beginning in 2000.

Researchers found that a history of depression was associated with a 29% increased risk of stroke, even after considering other risk factors for stroke.

Further, women on anti-depressants, particularly ones involving SSRI’s (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors), had an even higher risk of stroke – 39% higher.

These are correlative findings, so we have to be careful about the conclusions that we draw.

But obviously, depression and stroke are two things that can’t be randomized.

However, this is a prospective study (it follows a group of people over a long period of time) and therefore is thought to manage some research problems encountered when not dealing with randomization.

Now back to our initial question about what comes first – stroke or depression? Other research has also correlated the occurrence of stroke to increased chance of depression.

Unfortunately, the incidence of stroke is increasing in many countries, so it is important to look at the factors related to stroke, as well as possible new treatments to improve life following a stroke.

The same goes for depression.

One thing we’ll be looking at when I talk to Sharon Begley, Senior Health & Science Correspondent at Reuters, is the power of neuroplasticity to treat stroke.

I’ll be talking to Sharon this week as part of the New Brain Science 2012 series.

We will also be discussing:

• The six emotional styles of the brain and what that means for your clients
• Emotional types involved with autism and depression
• Techniques for working with the brain’s emotional style
• The power of neuroplasticity for treating stroke and Tourette’s Syndrome
• Three interventions to strengthen neuroplasticity

You can listen for free at the time of broadcast, you just have to sign up.

What have you seen in terms of the connection between stroke and depression in your practice? Please leave a comment below.